Global indexes are facing weak start of the week, safe-haves are still attractive - market wrap

With the much-anticipated central-bank meeting now behind them, investors this week will be eager for signs of constructive progress in U.S. Gary Cohn said in an interview he expects tax reform to pass this year and that he didn’t intend to resign over the president’s reaction to riots in Virginia.
Treasury traders will look forward to inflation and payrolls data that will be key for determining the Fed’s next moves. Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland President Loretta Mester urged her colleagues to look past recent weak inflation data and to stick to their gradual pace of lifting interest rates.

“With both the Fed and ECB talking about ending QE or at least tapering, it looks like they’re trying to move the other way, convincing markets that we are seeing growth and inflation and that bond yields will rise,” Steve Goldman, managing director at Kapstream Capital in Sydney, told Bloomberg Television.

Also at the Jackson Hole symposium on Friday, Bank of Japan Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said the recent pace of growth in the world’s third-largest economy is probably unsustainable and pledged to continue with very accommodative monetary policy “for some time” because the BOJ is far from its inflation target.

Stocks
Euro Stoxx 50 futures fell 0.4 percent in early European trading. S&P 500 futures fell 0.2 percent as of 7:32 a.m. in London.The underlying gauge surged to its best week in a month on Friday.The MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 0.1 percent.

Currencies

The yen advanced 0.2 percent to 109.11 per dollar, extending gains from Friday. The euro climbed 0.1 percent to $1.1932 after touching $1.1965, the highest since Jan. 6, 2015. The Bloomberg Dollar Spot index lost 0.1 percent, extending a 0.7 percent decline on Friday and reaching the lowest in more than 2 1/2-years.

Commodities

Gasoline futures on Nymex for September delivery soared 5 percent to $1.7499 a gallon as of 2:07 p.m. in Singapore. Gasoline is the largest single volume refined product sold in the U.S. and accounts for almost half of national oil consumption. West Texas Intermediate crude fell 0.3 percent to $47.71 per barrel. It advanced 0.9 percent on Friday. Gold rose 0.5 percent to $1,297.58 an ounce.

Source: Bloomberg Pro Terminal

Trader Bozhidar Arabadzhiev

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